Again, the timing is surprising and a bit of a surprise given that Apple is only months away from expected to enter the world of face-mounted computing with mixed reality headsets. Amazing. This suggests that one of these two tech giants has completely misunderstood the market. Google believes it’s the right time to move away from augmented reality. It’s the right time to enter. Both cannot be right.
Google Glass is buggy. This isn’t exactly new, but it’s now official: The company finally retired the business version of its product this week. It has replaced a much-hated consumer device whose wearers faced ridicule and occasional physical violence, coining the term “hole in the glass.” came to an end, but not immediately.
Google’s negative experience in this area could be beneficial to Apple. For Apple, this is a very important launch, one that could one day rival the success of the iPhone or usher in a broader ecosystem that could tarnish Tim Cook’s legacy forever. Apple needs to look at what Google failed to do and the obstacles it couldn’t overcome and find another way. This is where the importance of timing comes into play. The biggest question facing both Google then and Apple today is how face-mounted devices differ from the technology products we spend most of our time with. With the advent of tablets and smartwatches, essentially replicating the smartphone experience on a large or small screen, there was no need for a paradigm shift in the user-device relationship.
It’s still a small glowing rectangle tucked away somewhere on the body that I’ve pulled out and looked at when it needed attention…but smart glasses, especially mixed reality headsets, have a lot to offer in most users’ lives. It requires an unprecedented relationship with technology and the world around it.
Google Glass is in many ways a “your face” object, successfully making users look like hipster braggarts, crazy futurists, or Orwellian whistleblowers. And this was a relatively unremarkable product that at least somewhat mimicked the look of regular eyeglasses.